Visakhapatnam: Police and district officials of various government departments were kept on tenterhooks due to the last minute arrangements for the visit of VIPs to attend a high profile wedding on Wednesday.
More than half the state Cabinet ministers, MPs, a few Union ministers, and around 50 MLAs, bureaucrats, leaders of various political parties are going to reach Vizag from Tuesday to attend wedding of ports and infrastructure minister, Ganta Srinivas Rao’s daughter.
Police and other district officials were busy in security arrangements, to provide accommodation and other protocol obligations to the VVIP guests on the list.
The high profile wedding is slated to be held on Wednesday morning. Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy, Governor, E.S.L. Narasimhan and Tamil Nadu Governor K. Rosaiah have confirmed their coming.
With the government circuit house having limited accommodation and given the long list of the guests, officials had to find rooms for them at star hotels on the Beach Road and at guest houses belonging to various PSUs located in the vicinity.
To avoid any embarrassment, GVMC staff had worked overtime to repair the potholes on the road leading to the wedding venue — AU Engineering College Grounds — where a huge film set was erected.
Artisans and Tollywood workers from Hyderabad were sweating it out for a week to construct the venue. Union tourism minister K. Chiranjeevi would be the main attraction at the wedding while political observers are waiting to see if TD chief N. Chandrababu Naidu would attend the wedding or not.
Ganta Srinivasa Rao has begun his political career as a TD MP from Anakaplle and there are speculations that he is likely to switch over to the regional party shortly due to the Congress decision to bifurcate the state. Rao too personally visited Naidu to invite him to the wedding.
There were many rounds of meetings by the senior district officials and the police on the arrangements. "We have entrusted the job of accommodation of a minister to the respective department staff. However, we are reviewing and monitoring the protocol and other issues from time to time so that there will not be any lapses," said a senior district official.
